I have multicarts running on 1.5.6.4. Been using it for a few years without much issues other than SEO and UI problems. Wondering if there is sufficient reason to upgrade or maybe move onto to something different? Some things I would like would be an app to upload photos into any location. Maybe add a photo to product. Or create a blog post on the fly. I just get the feeling that my competition using Shopify, Wix, Wordpress, etc. are beating me because it is easier for them to update and manage their site. I think some of it is feature issues and some of it is website content and layout issues. I feel like I need to rework my website and take a fresh approach, but I'm not sure what cart software I should go with.

Well, there is an old saying, never change a winning horse. And when it comes to OC,
one has a lot of Versions to choose from, but no-one really knows. And as a consequence of
this, one cannot really rely on anything, published around here. It's mostly personal Arguments,
instead of qualified Tech-Talk, and much of it comes from people, who never showed a simple
sample of their competence yet, by i.E. presenting a bloody link to a real working Software.

So, it's more a cold-war scenario of different Indeologies, possibly combined with some hidden
financial interest as well. But honest Shop Users should not be believers, and sure not Ideologists,
but rather depend on figures and facts, if they already use a proven working OC Software Engine.

But this does not mean, to keep it, as it came, in contrary, one could always improve the design,
by adding i.E. a responsive Bootstrap Theme to a Version, not yet containing such be default. Also,
an updated Version (1.5.6.5_rc) exists, since some Misses have still been found and fixed, after the
release of the last 'official' 1.5.6.4, but the Version got burried, in Favour of the unfamous OC v.2.0.0.

But in 5-6 Years from now, PHP 7.0.x may no longer be a supported Code, and then, regular
OC v.1.5.6.x will have to be replaced, because they don't work with PHP-7.1.x-+ anymore, as
they come. But in 5-6 Years from now, a lot of other Things will be changed, and OC will probably at
least carry a Version Number 5 or 6, so, there is no good reason, to fundamentally change change
a working Version at this time, just, to keep it working for sure. Especially under the aspect, that
security Sites do not carry any security warning about latest 1.5.6.x Versions, in contrary to some
later ones. And the Discussion is not about 1.5.x failures and misses, but about later ones, despite
of the fact, that a majority of existing OC Users probably still depend on older Versions, as everybody
can find out easy, by reading about at the Forum.

But whatever you do, some work will be involved, because OC-2 type Bootstrap Themes require some
changes and additions in controller and language sections also, to make 'em work. And the popular
responsive Theme Sellers like Journal, Pav, and others, did not change to 1.5.6.5, but still use unfixed
1.5.6.4 Versions in their 'complete' Theme Installation packs, so, better don't take a chance, to eventually
be confronted with additional Problems, you don't really need, to keep your Shop in running State.

I am in the process of creating a range of freely available V-2 Bootstrap Themes, matching PEKU's
fine OpenCart Edge, wich serves as bases, and it already includes some Routines and Code, able to
handle such Themes, without the need, to rework some OC System Files first: https://www.opencart.com/index.php?rout ... n_id=27779,
And by comparing it's Theme Code with others, it's relatively easy, to make other V-2 Themes work,
especially those, not containing any custom Controller/Model/System Files.

The only disadvantage of Peku's Version may be, that he also included OcMod, for what reason ever,
since it really makes no sense, to have OcMod + VqMod installed on any System. And for OC v.1.5.6.x,
no OcMods exist, exept in some of my Test Versions, I have therefore removed this function, after playing
around with for a while, because VqMod is easier to handle, since it does not use the DB, to keep the
OcMod Extension Content, but in the familiar VqMod way and sections.

Images of already modified OC-2 Themes for 1.5.6.5 can be seen here, and most of them work,
still, some minor Misses may still exist, but they have to be found first... http://opencart.li/themes.html

Just, to give you some ideas on, what is possible. But I am not a fighter for 1.5.6.x, I just use, what
I feel is still the most perfect working version for me. Without any Ideology, and without any financial
interest.

Well, there is an old saying, never change a winning horse....... Good Luck! Ernie

Thank you Ernie for the thoughtful reply. To me, the big problem with Opencart is the business model. There are many things I like about Opencart like the unlimited-ness and the multistore, but there many things I hate like all the mods you need to make it function properly. Honestly, I'd prefer to pay a monthly fee for them to have a single version that has all the features built in. I've dumped quite a bit of money and effort into 1.5.6.4 to get my main site www.BagToss.com to where it is at. There are some really cool features/mods that I'd hate to scrap and start over with. Not to mention all the fixes we've made through vqmods and some directly to the main files. Once you get it working right, it costs nothing to keep it going (which is cool as heck). So, if I'm going to upgrade, I don't think it will be to 2.x or 3.x. The improvements and available mods are not substantial enough to justify the trouble. But perhaps a different cart altogether. Maybe one based on Opencart. I've been looking at Store Hippo and Magento. Not sure what to think about storehippo. I like what I see in regards to multi-store and multi-vendor. Downside, to name one, is their user base looks low based on the forums. Magento seems pretty cool but don't know much about it yet.

Anyone else have any carts they would recommend? At the end of the day, I want a platform that will help me stay with my competition. Maybe it's not 1.5.6.4 fault that my site is crappy, but it doesn't really help.

Your version is not to bad, the only thing youre missing is a good responsive theme so your site looks good on any device.
when oc 1.5.6 was released most customers used a computer, but nowadays majority of traffic comes from portable devices.
So using a good responsive theme like journal 2 and there are may other around will improve your site and add a pro to yourpotential customers.
Also using oc 1.5.6 to the max will give a great seo advantage over your competitors, but you will have to yse your product tags in a clever way, utilize filters so its more easy to narrow down justthat product they are looking for.

for 1.5.6 thre are tons off free mods that will greatly improve your admin to enhance your workflow.
You need a few payedmods to make it perfect but im sure with the right amount off effort your shop can easy outcompete all your competitors, its nit the shoppig cart software, doing that, but the man or team behind the cart who creates product content, looks and usebility that makes the succes.

I run a even order shop, 1.5.4 modded to my needs, responsive design and all of my competitors are way behind me, if they come to close i just start to improve my content. and make sure my site just has better content and product descriptions

Some recomendations that will help.
buy a ssl certificate, if on cpanel hosting might be there is a free ssl (probally the most important no shop should be without ssl if you dont use it google will give you a penalty soon)
responsive theme
more modern layout
use product tags, the improve in site search and for google they add product relation.

Some recommendations that will help.
- Buy a ssl certificate, if on cpanel hosting might be there is a free ssl (probally the most important no shop should be without ssl if you dont use it google will give you a penalty soon)
- Responsive theme
- More modern layout
- use product tags, the improve in site search and for google they add product relation.

Thank you victor. We actually coded www.bagtoss.com to be responsive. There is a SSL for the checkout and login pages. Indeed a more modern layout is needed. Also, better use of product tags and meta data is needed.

So one choice which seems to be good is to tweak my current configuration. There are certainly some low hanging fruit there. But a competing option is Magento 2.2 with a custom theme from themeforest. It seems to be super powerful like OC but maybe better. I don't know. So I'm going to install it on my server and see. I would love it if someone could tell me why I shouldn't before I waste any time.

Not sure its a waste of time, you Will have to decide yourself.
Magento is a great platform.
It laks the same SEO compared to oc, it extreem server hungry has a high complicated learning curve and if you want modifications they are expensive.

Make sure your ssl is site wide. Not Just the standard pages All pages should be ssl but that goes for All eccomerce on the internet.

Correct me if in wrong, but it looks like your site is B2B
In my humble opinion B2B needs a clean looking template, the design should focus on product not looks.

Last edited by victorj on Thu Feb 08, 2018 10:02 pm, edited 1 time in total.

- It lacks the same SEO compared to oc
- it extreme server hungry
- has a high complicated learning curve
- if you want modifications they are expensive.

I'm curious as to why you think OC has better SEO capabilities. Is it that this are better extensions that help with SEO? Or the "SEO keyword"? Or the meta data fields? This is truly very important for me. I feel that when I moved my website from static HTML pages to OC that my google ranking and organic visits went down. Seemed to me that google didn't like what I did or I had some bad tags. I'm kindof hoping that Magento does a better job at preventing these problems and automatically does (or guides) best SEO practice.

In Regardstraat of SEO, pretty much All carts oc, Magento, prestashop etc All have the same SEO fields.
Oc in addition has product tags wich add a extra SEO fields.
If used wisely they Just add that little extra compared to the Others.
There are a lot of mods that Will fill out All SEO fields, but the best is the man that did his keywords research and carefully selected Just those keywords important for their range of products.
Also a template does a lot for SEO.
Your current template had a very small container, wich leads to most of your content is below the "fold"
That is below what you see on your screen when opening a page.
In order to see that content you need to scroll down.
Content below the fold is indexed with a lower rank.
Expanding your container Will show more, thats why you need a better responsieve template.

Also Just create a site and hope for the best Does not work in the long run.
Your site needs to be a active site, so you need to maintain your website on e regular base, improved descriptions on a few products each time, create unique content.
This is important because IT shows Google your site is alive and Beying worked on.

If you are the customer and the solution you have now on OC works I think you don't need to change to something else as it will be a waste of money. On the other hand if you need new features as you said and some of them are hard to get (badly build plugins) or build them your self (gallery image, basic bloc, video for products, custom fileds for products etc) than maybe is a good idea to asset the needs you have and find the best platform for that.

From my experience moving a website with many custom plugins and vqmods from OC 1.5 to OC 3 was a hell as the whole template was rebuild from scratch in twigg most of the plugins needed upgrades and fixes and 60% of the vqmods needed refactoring. We tried to move to an event based modifications system but if you need to modify existing views it was too difficult to use it so we have now a mix event based and vqmod modifications on the websites. This makes it a hell to develop and maintain. The other problem was the lack of official technical documentation, you will need to discover yourself where they moved functions and what the new features are or spend many hours on the git to find out where stuff is and how to fix it.

We started moving websites to other platforms (custom or opensource) just because of the unpredictable upgrade timeline and the lack of futures and general support for OC. We still have a few websites on OC and want to give it a change, but from a technical view point the future does not look great. Over the years all the initial problems and the lack of features from version 1.5 improved little over time and very chaotic without a clear path. As a developer company I am not sure that I will reccomand OC as I did 8 years ago but the platform is stil very nice for some niche projects.

Well, for a good while already, I have been under harsh criticism by Dev's,
while refusing, to blindly 'follow' the OC Bandwagon, as most others do.
But most assume, to have no choice, or then loose sales, and such makes
it very difficult, to argue about such in a more 'neutral' and distant way.

But it's the 'Ideology' itself, what runs out of shape, by depending on shared
knowledge on one side, while not 'including' existing third-party Wisdom, but
trying to implement 'proprietary' Code, like OcMod, whereever possible, just
to have most everything in it's own exclusive 'OC'-way.

But then, to expect Users, to be able to handle such, is more, than one can
expect. Most Users are no Coders, and Users have no time, to search a Forum,
to find out, that even Dev's most only exchange Arguments, instead of beeing
able, or willing, to 'follow' a common Goal.

It's therefore not OC's fault only, it's a 'combined' Problem, initiated by Dev's
and OC, and especially under the Aspect, that OC is not a free Shareware Game,
but a Moneymaker Software, and nothing else, for most everybody involved.

And a Project like this needs to strictly 'follow' some Standards, or it will not
last. Like in any other Business, on it's way of reaching a 'common' Goal, it's
as easy as that. But, to commonly agree on certain Spec's, before a Release
is brought to the market, is possibly more, than one could expect, under the
circumstances, as they exist. It's all about Competition, and that makes it
complicated, to find valid Solutions, from my distant point of view at least.

Web site maintenance activities will always be one of our enforced virtues. Why? Due to the change management being required on a day-to-day operation level. While the above addresses competitions and features, there's also the matter of core development where store owners needs to eventually adapt to those changes wanted or not.

For instance, BootStrap 4 has come in essence as it has been integrated into the latest release of Opencart. Despite the mount of extensions being distributed world-wide, features are still considered secondary strategies to convince users to add the publicized extensions into their stores due to the new evolution of using templates - and not addressing this as a more simplistic methodology as compared to prior versions.

First, let's focus back to the previous versions of OC. While the ways of publicizing those products and values to the public on the Marketplace have been reviewed by Opencart.com over the years, the risk management levels are still on a really high level especially for new users who would expect growing on a fast level with their Business. Time management has always been an issue in our lives, some for the good and some for the bad, as it all depends on the ways one to many may handle the heart of their productivity (and not only saying that monetarily). It is agreeable to see, to hear and to believe that all users handles their stores differently (marketing management focusing) and that products needs to be sold to the people by providing their services on Business hours.

However, it is also a matter of core development; who handles them and what type of team people needs to expect. Over the years, there has been a great deal of development with Opencart based on features and extensions. Some were even removed over the years since it may either be relative to providers compliancy or to the developers that decided not to maintain those assets anymore as part of their package.

Since the past year or two, here came the OC v3.x releases where core files required mass changes from one-side-to-the-other; the head-spinning and the reprimanding and the straight topic closed without closure notes by the founders part on GitHub where people still wanted more additions and service requests to be done as much as on the Opencart forum. Bug fixes have been released periodically on the forum as well on GitHub to improve the quality of service to the users with / without the team.

While I must say that, for those bug fixes being released by users where did resolved the actual issue, including myself, was a great gesture, it has been said numerous times before and must be said again; people are dedicating their time and effort to provide better results by writing clean codes compared to what this platform can deliver as well as providing their services aside from the creator where those extensions on the Marketplace and third party websites brings positivity to the users.

Then, there are those people who are looking to upgrade. Upgrading has never been an easy solution nor an easy way to process but simply to understand with the change management involved by software Engineers / Architects (providers handling payments and shipping transactions mostly). There's also the story about the Point-Of-Sales platforms (POS) where change might be required to validate every orders. Most of the people on the Opencart forum will address that the OC version must also be put to consider before buying an extension and that is totally true despite if a new user or a regular user needs to upgrade his store. Upgrades must be done for particular reasons and particular improvement that includes optimization and compatibility reasons.

And, then, came the OC v3.0.3.1 release. As being announced as a stable release from the downloads section, there are times when the OC team may simply forget to add a: un at the beginning of the term. It happens, believe it or not I mean … who would of thought that publishing a stable release would cause startup files to fail to load right at the beginning of the process especially when new store owners are at their fresh start on growing their Business online. Depending on the motivation of the OC team and what they can remember, on a day-to-day development strategy, core codes are being constantly changed since the beginning of the evolution of Opencart. While considering the how are they being changed are also being addressed on GitHub fortunately but rarely for the reasons that users reports about but rather where the OC team where see-fit despite of the competitions and features. It is rather considering:

- Which extensions am I using and what are their next compatibility versions being delivered to me?
- Which themes am I using and what are the unknown cause that I should rather address than from those that have already address before?
- After doing some tests on a separate server or virtual server, is the installed version of Opencart meeting the server requirements?
- Will I be able to make a backup of my own store and its database myself or will I have to hire someone to do it?
- Is my SSL Certificate still valid for a great period of time so that I don't jump on an unconsidered situation where the SSL certificate needs to be renewed as I must understand that this restriction has nothing to do with Opencart.

If the first three aspects cannot be considered, then there's no point of upgrading.

Some new features have been added into the core on the latest (un)stable release. At this time, users are in a phase of wonders and candy lands considering their next options with the stability of their online stores. Despite which platform is going to be used, they all have their flaws but on different locations unless a dedicated working team puts themselves together to reduce the risks and the impact management levels so that the Company or any related Company with Opencart and its users will not have to handle their Business levels to the Continual Service Improvement (CSI).

What we need, is an OC team being able to handle those situations in order to minimize the arguments and the critics and to step forward with the Service Requests and the Demand Management handled by their users and that includes the ones who supports those users on the forum, from their call centers and from their ticket system.

With that being said, if there's at least one particular place where free services can be handled without causing an issue online without any changes or evolution involved, you may be able to name them. However, the question will then become on knowing if you are able to meet those demands to your clients shopping for your products online.

Moving forward? It is up to you and always has been based on your personal decision to either stay or go. However, my two cents are, there are no such place where perfection does exist in development. If this were the case, no changes would be required since the beginning of time. Investment is the key of success to go beyond with the Business as well as considering a great level of site maintenance to keep your store alive. The question on how to do it on those ends is the reason why forum supporters / professionals developers can help you with those inquiries.

The most generated errors being found on Opencart forum originates from contributed programming. The increased post counters are caused by redundancies of the same solutions that were already provided prior.

I appreciate all the recent comments. I have been using Wordpress/Woocommerce for about a year now to see how it compares with 1.5.6.4. I bought a theme at https://themeforest.net/ and stripped it down. So far so good. I have to install many plug-ins to get the functionality I need but most are free. It is a well supported platform so plug-ins are abundant. I use Shipstation, so there is a plugin for it and it integrates perfectly. I use payflow and there is a really good plug-in for that that handles refunds. There are a few things that it might not do or I haven't spent the time to find a solution. I would say this is a worthy competitor.

Interesting read here. I am thinking about moving my site carguygarage.com from Yahoo to OC. I installed OC today on some space at DigitalOcean, pretty simple. I'll try to import the 7k+ products next. Any feedback is welcome.

Not sure its a waste of time, you Will have to decide yourself.
Magento is a great platform.
It laks the same SEO compared to oc, it extreem server hungry has a high complicated learning curve and if you want modifications they are expensive.

Make sure your ssl is site wide. Not Just the standard pages All pages should be ssl but that goes for All eccomerce on the internet.

Correct me if in wrong, but it looks like your site is B2B
In my humble opinion B2B needs a clean looking template, the design should focus on product not looks.

As for the PCI scans, that is correct. Which is why, I recommend OC v3.x releases to users most of the time on the forum.

The most generated errors being found on Opencart forum originates from contributed programming. The increased post counters are caused by redundancies of the same solutions that were already provided prior.

Not any of the OC Versions is upgradeable, as soon as it contains any Mods,
it's therefore rather idiotic, not to accept that fact. But OC is obviously full
of believers, with little or no sense for reality, that's the main problem, as I
see it.
Ernie